On Friday - September 8th, 2017 - Version 10.5.12 will be pushed to the main server. As promised, I'm bringing out another set of release notes and I'm excited to introduce this week's revision to you.

Last time, I mentioned the introduction of drop points. Whilst I had intended to include them in this revision, I've decided against doing so right now as I'm not comfortable with where the implementation is at and I do not have full confidence in the idea in its current form. I'm going to refine my ideas and go back to the drawing board as I want to ensure that I'm doing things right when it comes to choosing the direction of the drug system.

Drug Prompts

Since the first day of development, I've always wanted to lead the drug update in a direction that would encourage people to role play around them in a meaningful manner. The last system included hard-coded effects which, for the most part, were widely unpopular with the community. Whilst I can see the merit in forcing effects on to players, I feel like they do very little for the quality of role play surrounding drugs; those that wish to role play the effects of consumption will do so regardless of whether or not they're hit with OOC inconveniences. Those that do not have such desires won't decide to go that extra mile because their health is depleting.

So in this revision, I've taken a step to help those who do have the intention to role play the effects of drug consumption but may need a helping hand in doing so. When a player takes a drug, they will be presented with a prompt that will detail what effects it may have on their character and provide some general insight into what the drug is and how they should roleplay around it. The prompts can be disabled for those that do not wish to see them via the /togprompts command and the prompt for any given drug can be viewed on demand by typing /drugprompt [drug_id]. I'll be working with selected members of the community to ensure the content is up to par, and within the next couple of days, you'll begin to see these prompts in action.

Election Update

With the elections for the San Andreas State Senate at our doorstep, it's imperative that there is an adequate script implementation in place to act as a foundation for the electoral process. This revision introduces a new in-game platform for elections which makes the entire process easier to manage and configure and allows for more variance in election types. This may not be the most exciting enhancement, but it is one that'll serve a great purpose in the now, and in the months that follow.

Graffiti Revisions

The graffiti system has been an area of frustration for the community for quite some time; obtaining spray-cans has always been a difficult process and for something that plays an active part in various walks of role play around the server, that's far from ideal. I initially toyed with the idea of adding spray cans to 24/7 stores around the server, but I eventually decided against doing so for numerous reasons. Firstly, I felt that spray cans being so easily accessible could have a negative effect similar to that we've seen with baseball bats. Spray cans should be an accessory to roleplay and not something that people just buy because they can. Those making use of them should have legitimate reasons for doing so and for that reason, I felt that merely allowing testers to distribute spray cans via /givespray would be satisfactory. I had planned to add a second step of moderation wherein a tag being sprayed would need to be approved by a member of staff too, but this didn't make it through the approval stage and therefore was not included in this update.

Radio Revisions

The radio system hasn't really seen much in the way of improvements in recent years and I thought there was a lot of untapped potentials. One feature that I've wanted to see for a while was the naming of frequencies to make it clearer to players what purpose the channel they're speaking on serves. Whilst this may be particularly useful for those in legal factions, the civilian population will see some use in it when common frequencies such as Air Traffic Control (ATC) are used. In addition to this, I've made some slight changes to the interdepartmental (/dep) radio which should encourage more realistic communication between legal factions. At present, messages sent over /dep are broadcasted to every member of a faction with the permission to view the interdepartmental frequency. Whilst this option will still exist, faction members will now be able to use /setdep to specify a target faction which in turn allows for a department-to-department communication system.

Duplicate Keys

Noble has made some great changes to the vehicle system which will allow duplicate keys to persist between sessions. At this time, a player can have only one duplicate key - but stay tuned for more changes concerning this!

Taking A Step Back

As months have gone by my lack of availability has become more and more of an issue, especially where drugs are concerned. I've hoped that my schedule would've cleared up by now and I've made numerous attempts to return to usual activity, but unfortunately work in real life and other obligations are making it impossible for me to do so right now. I don't want this to go on for any longer, therefore I'll be stepping back and passing on my responsibilities to others within the development team that have the time to take over certain areas of development. In particular, I'll be communicating with another developer to ensure that they have a working knowledge of the drug update. Once they're ready, they'll be taking over the brunt of the workload for it and I'll be advising them until I'm able to adequately commit my time to developing it alone again. With this, I am also going to be stepping down from my senior role within the admin team and taking on a low maintenance position that will require less of my time.

Thank you for your patience.

Version 10.5.12 will be deployed to the main server at 14:00 on 08 September 2017.

The full change-log can be found below.PADDINGPADDING

Additions:PADDING[+] A revised system to support the state senate elections.

Changes:PADDING[~] Revisions to the graffiti system:
-> [~] Testers are now able to distribute spray cans via /givespray. [~] Revisions to the radio system:
-> [+] A command which allows Lead Administrators to assign a name to owned radio frequencies:
--> If set, the name of the radio channel will be shown in place of the frequency number.
-> [~] The interdepartmental radio (/dep) can now be used as a 1-to-1 frequency:
--> [+] /setdep allows players to set the interdepartmental frequency (target faction) they wish to transmit over. This means that there is a 1-to-1 system in place as opposed to it being limited to global transmissions.[~] Revisions to the drug system:
-> [+] Prompts are now given to players whenever they use a drug. These prompts are intended to help players gauge an understanding of how they should be roleplaying the effects of said drug. [~] Revisions to the vehicle system [Noble]:
-> [~] Duplicate keys will now persist between logins; a player may only hold one spare key.

Fixes:PADDING[/] The Los Santos Fire Department can now disband roadblocks through the /disband command.[/] A drug with a DBID higher than 9 will now load as intended, allowing for new drugs to be introduced.

PADDINGPADDING
Until next time,otter

Last edited by otter on Sun Sep 10, 2017 2:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.